Anya wakes to the sound of hard rain on the windows, hard rain on the roof. When she opens her eyes, the day is liquid grey, her husband is stretched out warm and solid and finally still, and she thinks hazily that after such a disturbed night, maybe it's okay to sleep in a little longer. It's nice and cozy in bed.

Rupert's arm is loosely thrown over her waist, his hand not quite touching her belly. He didn't settle on this position until after five am; he's muttered and thrashed around all night, both before and after David's nightmare, which hasn't made it easy for her to get enough rest. She kept waking herself with worry, trying to hear if David was up again, trying to hear whatever vital thing Rupert's saying. At the thought, she brings her hand up to link with his–

And without warning his fingers tighten, just before he moves closer. "Darling," he says in a morning-cracked voice.

"Honey," she says. It's not an endearment so much as her affirmation that he's there, always there. "Does your throat hurt?"

A hard swallow, a harder exhalation. "A little, perhaps. How did you know?"

"Because you wouldn't shut up last night, you talked in your sleep for hours. I imagine your throat is raw by now." Awkwardly, because of their joined hands which at the moment she doesn't feel like separating, she wriggles around to face him. He looks still a little tired, but his smile is sweet. With her free hand she reaches up to push back his rumpled silver hair. "So what are you repressing this time, hmm?"

"'Repressing'? What makes you say that?"

"Oh, call it my intuition," she says, then nips at the point of his chin.

His other arm comes round her, brings her sharply against his body. "If the next words out of your mouth are that I'm the 'paperwork type,' darling, I'm going to avenge myself. It might involve damage to those bloody upholstery swatches."

She actually didn't mean to echo their exchange during Willow's spell long ago, although she does love to remember it. Smiling, she says, "Cranky, cranky man–"

But he kisses her insult away, warm morning-sour pleasure and punishment. When he pulls back, however, he's not smiling. He pushes her tangled hair (blonde-streaked at the moment) away from her face, his touch lingering on her cheekbone, his gaze intent on her. "Anya," he says, and then pauses. It's a long pause, long enough where she can begin to worry again over everything, hear her fears beating in the hard rain on windows and roof. "Right, er, I can't actually remember ....there was a spell I was trying to work, a banishing spell, but I didn't have the right tools. I had the words, but then they disappeared." He frowns before he finishes with, "Just an ordinary anxiety-dream. No repression."

"Anxiety-dream, huh. I usually have those when I'm awake. They're easier to remember that way." When he not-quite-chuckles and then nuzzles her neck, she holds him closer. "By the way, it's raining."

"Um-hmmm." It's an indeterminate sound of agreement, or possibly lust. He's stirring against her.

She wants to let herself go, slip her hands inside his pajamas and find him, make him hard, bring him safe and hot into her while the liquid grey light plays over them. Still, it's more important to make this point clear: "No, honey, I mean it's raining. As in, you don't have to go out and search for clues about the supernatural beast, because all phosphorescence, demon footprints, etcetera, will have been washed away." Not that a fifty-six-year-old man with a sore throat has any business running around in cold December wet anyway, she thinks but doesn't say.

He knows what she's thinking, however; he's frowning again when he pulls back. "I'm going to have to investigate, Anya, rain or not. But yes, I'll start with indoor activities first. Get Dawn and possibly that tosser Camp on the research job as well –"

"Call the coven to see what action they're already taking," she suggests. "As for Camp, I still say, Go toasting fork. Choose toasting fork."

"Ha ha." After one last hard kiss, he rolls away from her – she feels the heat-loss even before he throws back the covers and gets out of bed. In her scramble to pull the bedclothes back up, she almost misses his, "But you're right about the coven, darling. I'll check with Gillian and Willow first thing after my shower."

"Good enough. So where does breakfast fall in your schedule?" she says, in the midst of enjoying the orderly way he's collecting his pair of jeans, his two shirts, and his boxers from the depths of the armoire and putting them on the foot of the bed. Good angle on the flex of that still very toned arse in nicely draped pajama bottoms, in fact.

"Fuck's sake, must I decide everything all at once?" he says, tossing a pair of socks on the pile. Then he flashes a grin at her. "Once I've showered, I'll set up the complete programme, including a full range of research activities for you."

After almost seven and a half years of marriage he's quite good at anticipating when she's going to throw something at him, so he dodges the pillow-missile with ease. At least it's his pillow on the floor, she comforts herself.

A couple of doors down, the toilet flushes. David must be awake, which means that David's mother should get up. Now that she's listening, she can hear the sound of the water going downstairs as well: Dawn and/or Watcher-Jerk must be showering too. "Please don't use all the hot water, Rupert, not even in the course of vengeance," she says.

"Yes, dearest. I shan't even take time to shave." As he picks up his clothes, he kicks at a swatch on the floor. "Besides, I've decided to reserve my vengeance for that wretched ottoman of yours."

"Anyone who touches my ottoman without permission will feel the full force of my wrath," she announces as she throws back the covers.

There's a thud from out in the corridor, as if something just slammed against the wall, and the dogs bark short and sharp like a warning. As she sits straight up in bed, Rupert sticks his head out of the door to check – "Oh dear, David, are you all right? Did the wall jump out and grab you?"

"No, Dad," comes a small voice from outside, just before her tousled, wide-eyed son appears in the doorway, accompanied by dogs. "I mean, I'm all right. Morning, Mum."

"Good lad." Rupert rubs David's shoulder reassuringly. "Now, if you'll excuse me–"

"No, Dad. Mum...." To her surprise, David puts his arms around Rupert, clutching as tightly as he did last night.

Renewed worry and unformed dread begin to howl, and in seconds she's out of bed and into the cold, kneeling at her son's side with her arm on his shoulders. He shifts his weight to lean on her, all little-boy smells and shivers. "What's wrong? Are you sick, or is it about your nightmare?"

He doesn't say anything for a long moment. Her gaze meets Rupert's – their shared fear echoes and amplifies until she can barely hear David mumble, "Wasn't a nightmare, actually."

Rupert drops his clothes and then kneels down too, so that they're a unit of three, arms around each other like wards around a house, Macallan and Cava the sentries nosing past the walls. "What was it, then?" he says.

Biting his lip, David looks at them both. Then: "S'pose it'll sound stupid and you won't believe me and stuff. But I know that Mr Camp is a Catcher. I saw him last night."

She and Rupert say together, "Tell us."

And the three of them sit down on the floor while David talks about going downstairs in the middle of the night, about having Mr Camp walk toward him with outstretched hands like claws in the dark, about David's using the words that he'd overheard Rupert saying, about Dawn's rescue. The story is a little thin in places, such as why on earth he was running about the damn house at one-thirty in the morning when he knows it's forbidden, but she knows her son. She knows this is real.

The cold from outside bleeds through the walls and into her bones as he talks, and the echoes of a thousand years of vengeance drum louder than the rain on windows and roof. Not since that horrible night in Sunnydale, drenched in blood and remorse, has she ever wanted her powers back. Now she does.

Rupert knows this, of course. He slides one hand over to her shoulder and holds on, even as he says, "All right. We're going to find out more–"

"But he's a Catcher, Dad!"

"I understand that, David." Rupert's words might seem calm, but she knows her husband too: she can hear the dark violence underneath, not directed at their son but at anything who would threaten him. For some reason it eases her own rage, channelling it into order so that she'll be able to handle the crisis. She mirrors his action, locking onto his shoulder, feeling his own anger knotted into his muscles, as he says, "But we don't know what kind, do we? Even though all Catchers are the same, the methods to fight them aren't. We need to know who exactly he is."

No, we should toss that evil ass out into the rain, right after disembowelling, Anya wants to protest. But the current between her and Rupert is strong enough to keep her focussed. "He's right, David. To be safe, however, while Mr Camp is here I want you to stay with either your father or me at all times."

"Right. Or Aunt Dawn," David says.

"Let me tell Dawn privately first, but then, yes, you can trust her as well –" Rupert's words are broken by the tinny alarm of her mobile going off. With a muttered curse and a crack of his joints, he gets up and goes to her bedside table, digs inside her purse for the phone. After a frown at the display, he clicks it on. "Giles here. What is it, Willow?"

While Rupert makes noncommittal listening noises, Anya shifts her weight; before she's even settled, David has forgotten his big-boy independence and climbed into her lap. He's getting so very big, she thinks as she cuddles him closer. When her mind conjures an image of claws reaching out for him, she closes her eyes, kisses his hair, and mentally lists wards, barriers, shields, to keep him safe and herself calm.

The rain beats harder now, streaking like blood down the windows. She can't hear the sounds from downstairs any more

David sighs, then scoots out of her arms. "Sorry, Mum," he says, catching hold of Macallan's fur.

"You don't have anything to be sorry about, son," she says. The look of guilt on his face makes her pause–

But then Rupert says into the phone, "No. No, Willow, we'll go out this morning and see what we can. Right – and I'm so sorry about your cat. Yes, fine, I'll call you later."

"What's this about seeing, and what about the Great Cat?" Anya demands as he drops the phone back into her bag.

He's turned away from them so she can't see his face, but she can see tension-pain in his shoulders, the anger-knots in that broad back. "Er, it seems that the wish-hound was rather busy last night. Willow and Fred, er, lost their cat when he crawled out through the window, and when Fred went into the village this morning, she heard that other pets were also taken. Killed. Except...." He hesitates, gathering his thoughts, before he says, "It wasn't just pets. And after some consultation with the seers, Gillian apparently believes this is not a traditional wish-hound."

"Well, what is it, Dad? Is it Old England animals? Like wolves, or boars, like in the Forest Sauvage?" David says.

But Anya has heard Rupert's real hesitation – 'it wasn't just pets,' he said. Even before he turns around and she gets a good look at his eyes, she has a nauseated certainty that she knows what else might be threatened.

He doesn't confirm it then, of course, David's right there. But after he evades David's question, after he takes a quick shower while she helps their son choose his clothes for the day and make his bed, he finds her alone in the hallway. While David hums his octopus's garden song nearby, Rupert says quietly that there's a little-known adjunct to the Devon Catcher story, found only in coven records which Gillian has withheld from him and Willow – the demon has a hound that can take on his attributes, eat small creatures, and steal children.

Geoff and Mary Davis's toddler Jack – a cute little boy, Anya's seen him in the shops a time or two – is gone from their cottage. The only things left behind were his Pooh blanket and his shoes.

They hold onto each other for a long moment, while David sings and the rain beats all around and above them. "You're right, honey. Not everyone is protected as we are," she says into his shoulder, and he kisses her gently in answer.

After her own shower, taken so fast that the water almost doesn't touch her body, she collects her darlings and the dogs, and they go downstairs together. David's being brave now. He won't let her or Rupert hold his hand – "Cos the Catcher shouldn't know anything's different," he says, his mouth set in his father's stubborn lines – and his footsteps are defiant and heavy on the treads.

But she keeps her hand on Rupert's back, circling on his knots, holding onto the current between them so she can maintain focus.

At the landing the dogs burst out of formation, barking short and sharp like an alarm. Below them all, Dawn stands at the wish-table, getting out a match to light the pillars. "Morning, you guys!" she says, smiling up at them.

The dogs hurtle through the entryway and then throw themselves at the door. Out of sight, Mr Camp's voice says, "Oh hey there, guess y'all need to go out."

"Wait –" Rupert begins, and Dawn echoes, as Camp comes out of the lounge and goes to the door.

"I'll handle it," the man says over his shoulder, as he opens the door on a rush of wind and rain. The outside lights are still shining, an odd note in the grey day.

Anya can see that Camp does something to break the barriers, she doesn't know what. But as Macallan and Cava whine at the threshold, the lit match Dawn's holding goes out and the good magics fall apart.

And Anya can see a bundle of....something...lying at the front gate. Regardless of the rain, red is streaked on the gravel around it, spreading underneath. Spreading closer to Swallow's Nest.

***

The open front gate creaks wetly, swinging just an inch or two on its own. Gravel crunches underneath Giles's feet; he's careful not to step on the bloodiest of the stones as he works. The shovel scrapes on the rocks as he pushes it underneath.

Fred wipes moisture off her face – tears, he thinks – then holds out the already burdened sack. "You gonna be able to get this in too?" she says as matter-of-factly as she can.

"I think so." When he lifts with an effort, the mutilated body of Mrs Bentley's toy poodle raises into the rain. Dirt and rock and bits of torn flesh cascade off the sides of the shovel, all tainted with what the Devon Catcher's hound left behind. Grimacing, he slides the body into the bag.

Red remains on the gravel, streaked by the rain.

She ties off the sack. "Thanks, Giles, I'll get them to the site, set the protection even if it's too late. I'll tell Mrs Bentley we did what we could."

"Yes." He looks back toward Swallow's Nest. David, bright in his yellow slicker, sits watching on the top step; he's safe for the moment in the circle of Anya's arm. After spending a breath in vain longing for a world where he could protect his son from all knowledge of the dark things lurking inside as well as out, he turns back to Fred. "I'm so sorry about the Great Cat, you know."

"Stupid thing thought he was bigger than he was. Sure, Willow hadn't set the wards for the night yet, but he still didn't need to go out the bathroom window when he heard a devil-dog howling for blood," she says. But he can see the anguish behind the composure – she was the one who had found the body crushed against the stone of Yew Cottage, just beside the door. Too close.

And she's the one who's had the hard task of talking to Geoff Davis, who still thinks that his child's loss is just an ordinary kidnapping.

So he says, "Thank you for this, Fred. Will you be at the cottage afterward, so I can tell Willow?"

"Yeah. I'll go there.... after." She lifts the bag a fraction, exhales hard. "Anyway, when she gets here you tell her to be careful if y'all are going to the Devil's Seat, and you tell her to call me as soon as y'all get back."

"I will. You take care as well." He steps back to let her pass through the gate, head for her car. Then he walks back to his family, dropping the shovel along the way.

Anya's already on her feet, pulling David up with her, such light in the midst of lowering darkness. "While we wait, I could make you some tea, honey." She makes herself smile. "With honey, honey. Look, repetition for the sake of stress-relieving humour."

"To which I can only say, 'oh dear Lord,'" he says, making himself smile back.

"Bizarre. Come in, Dad," David says in a voice he perfected when he was five, a blend of my-parents-are-so-weird and let's-get-on-with-it. Giles treasures that voice, as alarmingly like Anya's as it is.

When he reaches the steps, he hesitates. He's just noticed traces of blood on his fingers, he doesn't want to touch her or David – but Anya takes away the choice and links her fingers with his, and David reaches up to hold onto his belt loop. A trifle awkwardly, they walk into their house that way. They only break apart to hang up their coats. He keeps his on the outside, however, ready. Sheltering theirs.

In the kitchen, the dogs are finishing a late breakfast, and Dawn's leafing through one of the sadly inadequate texts he has on the Devon Catcher. "Edward's downstairs. He'll be up in a minute, though," she says in a well-feigned normal tone, even as she pushes away her coffee cup in order to pull David close.

She's handling it well. Anya drew Dawn aside earlier, just after the wards were broken and while Giles took Camp outside to look at the destruction the hound had wrought, and she told her what David had seen. Dawn listened, then said under her breath, "Okay, that makes a weird kind of sense. When I caught him in the hallway last night, I thought his eyes looked... wrong." Since then she's been vigilant, never letting Camp get too far away from her. Giles does know she can be trusted to manage her role in the plan they've cobbled together.

Washing his hands at the sink, watching the last red drops blossom and then slide down his fingers, Giles considers that plan. Although he trusts his son's words, he needs more context for judgement – what kind of nasty work Camp is, exactly, whether demon, or sorcerer, or just evil human. The answer determines how they proceed.

But first, they need to get him the bloody hell out of Swallow's Nest and away from David.

When he turns off the water, he can hear the front door open, and then Willow's would-be light, "Hey you guys!"

"Kitchen!" Anya calls. She takes David by the shoulders, at which point he puts his feet on hers so that she's the only one touching the floor; then the two walk backward, in that silly game they've played since he was able to walk. They won't be able to play that much longer, however, he's getting too big.

Giles doesn't know why it makes his throat hurt afresh, a knife slicing through his attempts to stay calm.

He wipes his hands on a convenient kitchen cloth and then hangs it on its rack, repressing the urge to hurl it against the wall.

And Willow, dressed for the outdoors, appears in the kitchen doorway. She's been crying, eyes reddened and tear-tracks just visible on her pale face, but at the moment she's clearly trying for the same normality as the rest of them. "Hey, guys," she says again, and waves a roll of paper. "Here we go. Gillian finally coughed up the what." There's a flicker of power in her voice, a flash of light which suggests that her fellow coven members may be hearing much more, and to the purpose, about withholding prophecies and legend.

"What have we missed?" he asks, almost in unison with Anya, Dawn a beat behind that.

"Whoa, home-theatre surround sound!" Willow says, before she takes a seat at the table and unrolls the paper. There's not particularly noteworthy or antique about it – certainly this century, Giles determines, which is confirmed by her next words. "Apparently one of the coven members in the 1920s spent a convalescent summer writing down the lesser legends associated with the area, but when she was finished, somehow they got misfiled. Also, there was the whole she-was-crazy rumour which didn't encourage retrieval. Anyway, Gillian found them in an old desk years ago. But here's the thing." Her index finger follows along a broken line. "'The Devon Catcher has oft been seen with a great hound, pitch-black with luminous eyes. The hound, not properly a wish-hound by accounts, is able to walk by day as a normal canine creature, bound to its master's interests yet a free monster. Like its master, it can disappear even when there are no shadows; like its master, it can be called betimes by an unintended spell.'"

Dawn says, "So someone says the wrong spell, or says it the wrong way–"

"And the Black Dog shows up," Anya says.

Edward Camp says from the open door leading to the cellar guest rooms, "So, let me get this straight. You let this little fella listen to your cases and such?"

Giles picks up the kitchen cloth again, begins to fold it into tiny squares so that he doesn't succumb to his urge to throttle Camp. As his hands work, he says softly, coolly, "Occasionally, yes. I feel as disinclined to hear your comments on his listening as I did regarding his choice of reading, however, so if you'll allow Willow to continue–?"

"Of course," Camp says. He swaggers over to Dawn and sends his hand possessively down her back., bends down to whisper in her ear. She manages to hold it together, even smiles at the creature.

Giles makes another, smaller square – folding up his anger to carry in his pocket, he thinks with some bitter amusement. He'll use that anger soon enough.

Anya, holding a silent David even closer, says, "So how do we send the Catcher's dog away?"

"Oh, that's here too!" Willow says. Her finger zigzags down the page, seeking the words. "We'll want to seal up the Devil's Seat like we did with the Catcher himself – see, where we screwed up was that we didn't do it for both, but hey, we didn't know – and then speak the banishing spell."

"Which is?" Giles says.

"Um. Not exactly written down." Willow makes one of her eloquent wrinkled-nose faces.

With a breath Giles remembers his nightmares, his smoke-ridden attempts to grasp the one thing he doesn't know, his cries without echo, without answer. He can't think of that – he has to believe the answer will come. So he puts his folded cloth absently into the nearest drawer and says, "We'll figure it out after we seal the hound's home."

Camp drawls, "Well, that's pretty unconventional planning for a mission."

"Field work often works that way. Which reminds me – why don't you come with us?" Giles says. The man startles a little, his hand tightening on Dawn's shoulder. Giles allows himself a smile, one honed by years of interrogating hostile demons and other complete shits in the Old Council. "After all, it's time that a Watcher headquarters man like yourself, er, saw a bit of the real country, wouldn't you say?"

"Well, I didn't really pack for a walk in the cold English rain," he says.

"Are you scared of it, cos you'd melt away like the Wicked Witch of the West?" David asks. At Camp's glare, he backs closer to Anya and adds reluctantly, "Sir."

"No, little fella. And that's kind of–" Camp trails off when he sees Anya, Willow, Giles, even Dawn ranged against him. His hand taps nervously against Dawn. Then: "Guess it wouldn't hurt."

"David and I will stay here, of course," Anya announces. She and David begin walking themselves to Giles, and, with her words in time with the steps, she finishes, "We'll let the Watchers go on their Watcher adventure by themselves."

Giles pulls them close, breathes them in, as Willow and Dawn begin to scrape back chairs and rattle cups and dishes, while Camp stands alone. There's something strange about the man now, as if magics are breaking down. Giles thinks of what Fred said about the late Great Cat – 'Stupid thing thought he was bigger than he was.' He will have to be, and he will be, in order to keep his family safe, he thinks. No matter how much blood lingers on the stones.

***

Dawn has been hiking the Devon fields for seven years now, in summer and winter, sun and rain. The harsh wind off a tor has become comfort to her. She's walked with Giles, with Anya, with Andrew and Ian before they split up, with boyfriends long gone, with Willow and Fred. She's watched David dizzy himself, spinning with open arms against green grass or dark and light stone – in her imagination, it's a stop-motion film, sandy-haired toddler into larger child into six-year-old tough guy in a couple of airplane turns.

She has never felt so soul-deep wrong in these hills as she does now, with Edward Camp holding her hand in the rain. If she could scream like she used to, or if she could find one of these rocks and scrape her hand and self clean of his touch, she would.

It's worse than that moment in the middle of the night, when she found him in the entryway, when he turned and stared at her with gleaming, unfamiliar eyes. Then she only guessed. Now she knows. Knows something, not enough.

But at least she has felt his heartbeat – she hasn't been having sex with one of the Little People, the Good People who have no heart. She suppresses a shudder at the thought.

Giles and Willow walk on either side of them, steering them, steering the conversation. It's started out reasonably enough – talk of the hound and its victims, talk of why kill has been left as trophies only at Yew Cottage and Swallow's Nest. After a discussion as uneven underfoot as the ground they cover, it's agreed that since Willow, Giles, and Anya were the ones to have sent away the Devon Catcher, they're the target of its creature's wrath.

"Vengeance," Edward says, with a sidelong look at Giles that Dawn intercepts. "Ugly business."

"Vengeance indeed," Giles replies. She doesn't think that Edward hears the danger he's in.

As they pass further and higher in, and off Giles and Anya's land, the conversation changes. Willow asks how long Edward's been a Watcher. "Almost nine years," he says.

Giles says, his voice sharper now, "Nine years....then you were one of the lucky ones who escaped the blast at the Council? Or – forgive me if I don't know you – you escaped the Bringers' swords out in the field?"

"I was still at school. The Academy." The weight he gives the name is enough to tell Dawn that he doesn't mean the London branch she attended, but the now-gone public school out in the Cotswolds. The traditional one, she thinks, and she remembers dark stories told her by Wes, others hinted at by Giles.

He pauses a minute to catch his breath, his tight hold on her forcing her to stop too. He's ordinarily in pretty good shape, weightlifting in his gym several times a week to keep himself fit, but the climb seems to be getting to him. A few steps ahead Willow and Giles stop, turn back to look at him. The rain is coming down harder now. He says, "But I got sick my last term, had to fly home to Georgia. That's why I wasn't there when the bombs hit."

"Ah. So not quite a Watcher yet," Giles says, each word the point of a sword. Dawn's not even the target, and she can feel herself wince in reflected pain. 

It sends Edward off-balance, more so than the slippery stones underfoot. "Mr. Wyndam-Pryce thought I was, I was his–" he snaps, before he stops himself, breathes even harder, forces a smile. "You were a little busy, Giles, guess you missed an up-and-comer in the ranks."

"I suppose I did," Giles says.

Edward's hand slips from Dawn's, wet in the rain.

***

"–No, Xander, I don't care why you answered Andrew's mobile at four in the morning. No, really, I don't care if you can't seem to find a date outside the extended family." Anya, striving for patience she doesn't have, looks over at David playing tug with Cava. The sight of him, normal and just fine and unthreatened at the moment, lends her what she needs, and she says into the phone, "Xander, stop your unconvincing protests. Could you just please put Andrew on? It's an emergency."

While she waits, she scans the paper Willow's brought, reading it for the hundredth time. Words flash up at her in the well-lit kitchen, one in particular....'Wish-hound." Wish-hound, she thinks, they've been using that word all day but they need to really look at it –

And then the mobile squawks, and the familiar voice of her once-second-in-command, now trusted friend, says, "Anya? Is there an Investigations and Acquisitions crisis? What can I do?"

"Hello, Andrew. I need information about this jerk Edward Camp."

He takes a breath. "Dawn's Edward? He's very unpleasant, not that I've said anything because one's sexual partner is one's own business–"

"I'm not going to ask you about Xander, if that worries you. Camp is a Catcher of some undetermined kind who's threatening David, and we need to know why he's here. Do you know anything about his special project?"

"A Catcher who's threatening David?" Andrew's voice loses the nerdy, whining edge it had; he's all seasoned Watcher now. "I know he's talked his way into the headmaster position at the secondary school for Slayers we're putting together in Atlanta – he's not well-liked, though, so there's still significant opposition in the Council. He's no political mastermind like Palpatine...er, sorry. Anyway, he's in a precarious position."

"What's his other project? He keeps mentioning this secret deal, which I do understand is a secret, but if anyone would know the gossip, it's you."

His reply is lost in an explosion of happy dog-growls from Cava as she wrests the rope away from David, a bellow of boyish rage, then Macallan's alpha-dog intrusion into the playtime. "David, stop! I can't hear your Uncle Andy," Anya says as calmly as she can. Into the phone: "Just a second, Andrew."

"Sorry, Mum," David says, his guard dogs at either side. Shifting his weight uneasily, he adds, "Er, since the Catcher's gone, can I go play? I don't want to be a bother."

"Come here," she says, and he catapults himself into her embrace. "You're my son and I love you. You're not a bother. However, you are exceptionally noisy."

He burrows in for just a moment. "I promise I'll be quieter, promise. So can I play in the lounge? With the dogs? I'll even ring the bell if bad things get back in and stuff."

It's a struggle, but she steels herself to say, "All right. But the cowbell must be no more than five inches from your hand at any given time. If there's so much as a bird flying against the window–"

"Mum, I love you, you're brilliant!" She gets a smacking kiss from her boy, all toast crumbs and coffee he must have sneaked from Dawn's cup, before the David-blur heads into the hall, the dogs at his heels.

After she picks up Willow's paper and a stray pen, she takes the mobile to the doorway, from where she can see him hurdling her ottoman. Sighing, she says, "Okay, Andrew. What did I miss?"

"Man, I wish I was there," he says quietly, then in his usual manner says, "I don't know what the project is. But I hear that he's actually having trouble getting the Inner Council's approval for whatever. I don't know – do you want Robson's private number? You know, to ask him yourself?"

"You have Robson's private number?"

"Yep! I'm connected. Say, Xander, could you please hand me my PDA? And, um, turn on the light?"

Anya watches David play with the dogs while she waits and sends good wishes into the rain-light, thinking about the family who's lost their baby, worrying about her poor husband and Dawn out there with the Catcher. The more they know, however, the better they can fight – and maybe they're not as alone as they thought.

When Andrew gives her Robson's private number, she scrawls it on the paper just over 'wish-hound.' The word seems to flash whenever she moves.

***

Faint traces of red stain the rocks of the Devil's Seat on the top of the tor – new blood, mixed with the taint of the Catcher's hound.

At the foot of the stone formation lies a small body, its clothes torn and bloodied. The hound has brought its master a child, caught what the trapped demon couldn't any more.

For some reason the fact that the child isn't wearing shoes is the detail that hurts Giles most. Angers him most.

Crying out at the sight, Willow and Dawn begin the last steep ascent toward the rocks. "Come on, we need help," Willow says over her shoulder.

"Come on, Camp," Giles echoes, and he shoves the man ahead of him. The sense of something wrong emanating from Camp is stronger now, almost visible, like a spark or a tinge of smoke in moisture-rich air. Yet the man seems distressed enough when he bends down next to Dawn to inspect what's left of little Jack Davis.

Giles crouches down too, willing himself to maintain the Watcher-calm in which he was trained. "Perhaps you should call the authorities, Willow," he suggests, as he gently pulls the child's coat over his face.

"Yes. Yes, okay." Willow is too distraught to cry. In her own Watcher-voice: "Dawnie, if you could do the protection spell, before we –"

"Of course." As Willow walks away from the rocks, Dawn digs into her pocket and gets out the mixture she always carries, then scatters it around the body. He reaches out to help, and hands clasped, they speak the words they need, call on the forces that will help them. Good protection takes time, and they don't rush it.

When they've finished he can feel the good change in the air, in the rain, and they haven't even sealed the demon in yet. "Well done, Dawn," he says.

She leans her head against his shoulder and sighs in answer. "It's a hard day, Giles. Glad to be with you guys, though."

"Hey, you guys, the connection's crap, I can't get through – " Willow says, before she says in a quite different tone, "Wait wait wait, where did he go?"

Edward Camp no longer stands beside Dawn.

"Shit. Did the protection spell banish him or something?" Dawn says, as they scramble to their feet.

"Unlikely," Giles can hardly get the word out through his sudden swamping fear.

"Not that spell, Dawn, not no way. He's doing other magics somehow." Willow scans the hillside, saying just loud enough to be heard, "He'd better not be teleporting, because that's all kinds of badness."

But it's not teleportation. Giles can see something at the foot of the hill – rocks cracking together, disturbed even though all that can be seen is a shadow passing through grey rain. "Down there. An illusion of some kind," he says. A hard breath, a swallow of fear, before he manages, "Can you deal with this here–"

"Yes, just go!" Willow says, and Dawn, losing the quiet that's strangled her all visit, screams in the old way, "Go!"

And he does.

The ground is treacherous. The mud and loose stones and slippery grass cause his boots to slide as he runs, and he almost falls more than once. But still, he moves quickly. He's older now, but no longer is he the "out-of-shape shopkeeper" he was in those latter Sunnydale days – he runs with the dogs almost every morning, he plays squash with Jools twice a week, he hikes these hills with his wife and child.

It's for his child that he runs after the Catcher, even as the rocks slip under his feet, and he lets his anger loose at last.

He pays no attention to the harsh breathing and scrabbling paws of the shadow right behind him.

***

As he plays tug-of-war with Cava, dodging the sofa as he pulls backward on the rope, David sneaks another look. Yeah, Mum's still in the kitchen doorway, waving around the hand not holding the mobile. Mr Robson must be saying important stuff about the Catcher, cos her voice has got all high like it does at work when she's trying to investigate and the other person has information and she's not wanting to give anything away but she's mad.

"No, Robson, he didn't tell us any of that, and there's no way in hell we'd agree," she says. "And you do not want me to ask how the Council got David's test scores." Which is weird, he thinks, cos his reading tests and stuff aren't that interesting. But then her hand makes a fist at her side. She's more than mad now, but she's still listening to get her information.

She and Dad trade jobs some times, so that Dad buys things and Mum learns things. Or they trade taking-care-of-David jobs. He wouldn't ever ever say out loud that Mum doesn't read bedtime stories as well as Dad, but she doesn't. But that's not a bad thing, cos Dad says a person is hardly ever good at everything even though he has to try hard at everything anyway. Like Dad isn't too great with numbers, so Mum always helps David with maths homework – "and it'll be fun, David," she always says, "next come flashcards!" And then Dad groans really loud.

Besides cuddles and tucking in at night and maths, what Mum's also really good at is making him feel guilty-bad if he does something wrong with her treasures. It's justice, Dad always says with a funny smile, she's very good at rightful vengeance.

Still, guilty-bad makes his tummy hurt even though it's his fault. And that means that now the Catcher's gone, he needs to fix the hole in Mum's ottoman somehow before she finds out.

The ottoman isn't talking at him now, not loud anyway. 'S just little voices, "Come seeee, come seeee," humming like laceprigs in the background. The house doesn't seem so weird in the day, although rain makes funny shadows on the window and the floor. He scrambles up on the sofa arm and turns on a lamp. Its yellow light isn't stripy like middle-of-the-night, but the shadows don't go away.

"You should have asked us before you sent him. I don't care if you thought he'd damn himself, he's dangerous," Mum says into the phone. She's using the sharp-knife voice, and she's so furious that she stomps all the way into the kitchen, out of sight.

"Classic," David whispers. He takes a roll of invisible tape-stuff out of his pocket – he got it out of the kitchen drawer when Mum was washing the dishes– and then throws himself at the ottoman. The hole looks bigger and more like vengeance even in rainy daytime. One more check to see if Mum's watching, and then a screech as he pulls a bit of tape from its home.

But he stops. "Come seeee, come seeee," he hears again, and maybe it wouldn't hurt just to look.

Sticking the tape on a worn bit of the fabric, he pushes his fingers through the big hole, feels the cracks in the wood. He pushes more, the hum getting louder now so he can hardly hear Mum in the kitchen – then, wham, the wood falls apart underneath, and the stuff just rips, and the hole is big as his hand, and oh this is bad.

Then Cava and Macallan crowd against him and start barking, wild and deep like they do when they're scared, and David smells smoke. 'Cept the fire's not lit.

It's the Catcher. He's here, standing in the entryway just like last night, but he's breathing hard like he's been running, and his hands shake when he holds them out toward David. "Hey there, little fella," he says in a voice that's all shivery, and his eyes look funny-wrong. "I want to talk to you about a new school. A boarding school, that is, with me and your Aunt Dawn right there to take care of you –"

"No, get away!" David says, as the smell of smoke gets stronger, as the dogs bark louder. Get away, get away, they're saying.

He scoots back against the ottoman, but it's already broken, and his weight is too much – its bad leg, the one Dad fixed, snaps off. When the wood cracks, it sounds like a cricket bat hitting a ball, and the ottoman splits in half.

Only David can see the treasure that spills out of it. Three crystals, each one big as his fist.

"You get the hell away from David," Mum says from behind Mr Camp. She's still got the mobile in her hand, she looks like she's going to throw it at the Catcher.

But he throws first. It looks like smoke's coming from his hand but then the Catcher says a word in a language David doesn't know and there's fire in the air.

It reaches toward Mum like claws out of ragged sleeves.

"Mum, no!" David shouts. He grabs the crystals in both hands, cos they're treasure even though they cut into his skin, and he struggles to his feet. He can get there, the treasure might help –

And Mum steps out of sight for a second, gets safe out of the way of the bad magic, then comes right back before David can get scared. She's got a wish-candle in her hand now and that look on her face that means someone's in terrible trouble. With one fast move she catches the fire at the candle-tip and holds it like a torch. She makes the fire pretty, too, turning it all good colours like the inside of their house in London, and David would clap except his hands are full of the treasure.

Mr Camp raises his claws again, but Mum raises the candle, and then from the door there's Dad, saying, "Leave our home, Camp. You've lost."

Trapped between Mum's fire and Dad's cold, cold voice, the Catcher turns. He's got one hand forward and one hand back, and his face is sort of weird and melty around the edges like a mask, like the Wicked Witch of the West. But he still looks like Mr Camp. "See, I was afraid you'd be unreasonable, the way you turned your back on your duty all those years ago. If you'd just let me have David, Giles, if I thought I could convince you rationally and then the others would follow.... I didn't want to have to do this." Then he raises his hand and starts to say something in that weird language –

But Dad leaps forward, takes the Catcher by the shoulders, and spins him toward the door.

David really wants to see what happens next. With Macallan and Cava on either side, he stumbles forward til he's almost to Mum and Dad, and then he does see. Mr Camp has grabbed onto either side of the door, keeping him inside the house, but now there's something on the path outside.

It's a big black dog, no, bigger than a dog, like a pony almost, all funny-wrong eyes and stinky black fur and black fangs. And it's growling, and it's getting closer to the threshold.

This is worse than bizarre.

***

After pushing Camp away from his loved ones, Giles struggles to breathe – now that he's home, the effort's finally registered. Anya collects a fistful of his jacket, though, and her hold steadies him until his muscles stop trembling and his lungs start working again.

It's been a long, hard run with the hound at his heels. He couldn't see the beast until they reached the front gate of Swallow's Nest, but for the past mile the charnel smell and fog has threatened to smother him, just like in his dreams. He didn't know why the hound didn't attack, but he does now.

The Black Dog has found itself another Catcher: human or demon, all Catchers are the same. Whining, a long rippling howl that echoes off the stone floors, the devil-dog pads up the steps toward Edward Camp. Bloodied paw prints mark its path, and the rain turns red when the drops fall from its coat.

His head tilted, Camp stares at the Black Dog. "I didn't mean to call you," he says, at which the creature whines again in protest. Louder, he says, "No, I didn't mean to, but maybe I can use you."

"We can't let the wish-hound inside," Anya whispers to Giles. "Quick, honey, what's a good banishing spell?"

"You know it, Dad, you said it in your sleep," David says suddenly, appearing from around the corner with their dogs as his guard. Then he holds out his small hands. Three crystals, their plane faces catching the rain-light and lamplight, glow in his palms.

A whirl of coat and teeth, one step closer for the hound. "Hey there, what's that you have, little fella?" Camp says, and he holds out a hand as if to pull the crystals and David into his grasp. "Oh, you bright little guy, look what you've found. With my teaching you'll make a real Watcher of the old kind, see if you don't." When the Black Dog steps closer, almost to the door, Camp steps just outside so he can place his other hand on its head.

But a rain-swept wind comes through the open door first, blowing away both the charnel-house smell and the fog that has troubled Giles' dreams. Good wishes and fire, the right words and the right tools, coalesce in his mind: it's as if he's caught misty daylight and lamplight and candlelight, like the crystal in David's hand and the fire that Anya holds.

As Camp bends down to mutter dark words to the hound, Giles scoops up one of the crystals from David's palm. then holds the stone in the fire. The flame leaps almost to the ceiling when he makes his wish for love and safety, lighting the entryway. Concentrated light, the crystal burns in his hand – the right tool indeed – and he takes two steps, places the hot stone on the hound's head. When his palm crushes the stone against its skull, the hound whines, tries to get away, but it's trapped on the steps.

Giles calls to the light, saying, "Hie thee hence, And harm no more."

At the words the hound writhes, its mouth opening in a soundless howl like that of Giles' dream. Giles presses down once more, speaks the incantation again.

The wind sweeps through the door again, clean and fresh, even as Camp screams "No," and the Black Dog dissolves in one last burst of blood and charnel smell.

The outer steps are empty, save for the track of tainted paw prints that the rain can't seem to wash away, and Giles trusts Willow and Dawn to have sealed its lair. It has been banished.

Camp says slowly, "You shouldn't have done that. You shouldn't have been so unreasonable." His eyes look strange in the flare of light from Anya's candle, which burns merrily, untouched by the wind. The man raises his hands again, crooking his fingers; for the first time Giles sees the resemblance to claws.

David tugs awkwardly at his father's wet coat. "Go on, Dad."

"Yes, Rupert. Send this Catcher away, just like you did the demon one." When Anya raises the candle, Camp takes a shuddering step back. Then he regroups: the claws remain outstretched, the muttering begins anew.

When Giles takes a second crystal from David, the facets catch and concentrate the light.

"No," Camp screams, rushes forward – but Giles takes coldly angry pleasure in driving his elbow into the man's throat, and the Catcher drops onto the stone.

Giles slides the crystal into the flame. This time, Anya's smile is brighter than the fire. She cups her free hand around his, sheltering him, and together they speak their wish for love and safety.

When the flame leaps in its spectrum of saturated, familiar colours, David says, "Oh, that's so brilliant."

"Isn't it, David," Giles says, smiling at his son. The smile fades when he looks down at the creature fouling the entryway floor, however. After breathing through a sudden rush of pain, he crouches at the man's side, puts the hot crystal on the man's forehead, presses it down. Then, closing his eyes and calling on the light, he says, "Hie thee hence, And harm no more."

Edward Camp doesn't disappear, of course. He's a man, and thus bound by different rules than a devil-dog. But as Giles stands up with only a modicum of wincing, as David throws his arms around his waist and Macallan and Cava start to circle around, smoke trickles out from Camp and then dies in the wind through the open door.

The man looks much smaller than he was.

Anya goes to the entryway table and puts the lit candle back in its holder, then picks up the mobile Giles has just noticed is there. "Okay, Robson, how much of that did you hear?" she says into the phone. Listens for a minute or so. Beams, brighter than the four flames of the wish-candles that flicker untouched by the wind. "Yes, that sounds like justice to me," she says.

The wounds of the day burn clean in the fire, he thinks, and he holds David closer and then pulls Anya in.

***

Flames leap in the darkened cave of the fireplace, teasing at the tiled surround, sending light out into the dusk-brushed room. Dark comes early on December afternoons in Devon, which means that Anya can stand in the hallway and enjoy unobserved the picture of her men safe together. David spins around in a game of his own – it has something to do with airplanes, she believes, and it's usually followed by a gallop up the stairs for more serious play – and Rupert, freshly shaved and showered and sated with tea and muffins, is stretched out on the sofa, staring at the fire.

An arm drops over her shoulder, and Dawn says softly, "Thanks for the suggestion, Anya. And the bottles too, of course." She holds a big paper sack in her free arm; the fresh branches for mourning that Anya's chosen for Willow and Fred and for the Davises peek over the top, throwing shadows in the wish-lights.

"Well, they like cream sherry, who knows why. Besides, it's not like we're going to drink it, and I dislike waste. That stupid Jools always gets the wrong thing."

She pauses – David is spinning dangerously close to his father, there could be an accident. Before she can say something, though, Rupert reaches out one long arm and steadies their son, who says "Thanks, Dad!" before intensifying what are likely supposed to be engine noises and spinning away again.

She and Dawn stand there for a long moment, silent, until Anya says, "Okay, be safe on the road, Dawn, and be safe on the road back. We worry, especially now."

Dawn's hold tightens, uncomfortably yet pleasantly. "Geez, Anya, I'm only going to Yew Cottage for supper. I'll be back here for dessert. Edward's gone from Devon and gone from the Council, and my room is here." Then she rests her head against Anya. "My room is here," she says again, almost under her breath.

"Yes, it is – even though you're a good Watcher and your job means you have to leave us occasionally. Less now that you've chosen the sensible job in London, of course." Anya pats Dawn's hand before she says, "Now you'd better get going. Who knows what experimental dish Willow's concocted after the hard day she's had; timing to the minute might be involved."

"Oh, so that's why you're staying here tonight, it's fear of culinary art!" Dawn says, giggling. "You guys really do plan everything." Then she lets go. With one of her bursts of energy she dashes into the lounge, kisses David's cheek (who actually pauses in the dizzy-making activity), and waves to Giles before she plunges out the door.

Anya follows her to the threshold, catching the door before it can swing too far open. The wooden edge is cold on her palms, but the rain has stopped at last, just in time for early sunset. She waits until Dawn's got into the most recent family Saab, and she watches the headlights come on, watches them back into the lane, before she shuts the door. The bloodstains on the outer steps shine even in the dusk. The losses remain.

Dawn's wrong, she thinks. They try, but they can't plan for everything.

Rupert raises his head and smiles at her when she comes into the lounge. "There you are, darling," he says, and he starts to get up –

"Stay," she says, putting her hand on his chest. After only a token struggle, he lies back down. Then: "David, whatever are you doing? Or more to the point, why?"

He's hopping over to the corner where the broken halves of her beloved ottoman are laid carefully, one on top of the other. Then he turns around and stands still, folding his hands together. "Er, well," he begins, in exactly his father's voice except an octave or so higher. "I think I have to confess."

When she sits down on the edge of the sofa, right by Rupert's waist, he scoots over a little and curves an arm around her, resting his hand on her thigh. "Confess," they say in unison.

"Right. Cos I didn't mean to, but I sort of broke the ottoman even before the Catcher came back today." Earnestly, the firelight shining on his face, David tells them the story of the talking house and furniture and why he had really got out of bed that night. Then he confesses the fabric-ripping and the tape idea and the inappropriate lack of earlier confession. "So I'm sorry, Mum, I'm really sorry, and I know I have to feel your force of your wrath and stuff," he finishes, bowing his head.

Rupert has to turn his face into the back of the couch to stifle his laughter. Idiot male.

Before she can explain loudly and in great detail the manifold errors David has committed, however, her gaze is caught by the last of the crystals; it gleams on the mantel, centred between two candles. The light on its facets reminds her of what they've feared and what they've gained. So she gets up, crosses to him, and kisses his forehead. "Do you feel guilty about what you've done?" she asks seriously.

"Yes, Mum. Right here." He pats himself just above his stomach.

"Then never do it again, and we won't talk about this incident any more."

"Actually?" he says, eyebrows drawn together in disbelief.

"Actually." She kisses his forehead again, and then stands up.

He throws his arms around her for one of his whirlwind hugs before he spins away. "That's classic, Mum, you're very good at rightful vengeance!"

"I'm what? Very good at rightful...." She throws a look over her shoulder at Rupert, who's sunk into the cushions, contemplating the ceiling in a suspiciously absent-minded manner. "Um, okay."

"Cool. So may I please go upstairs and play with my planes I brought from London?" David says.

"Of course," she and Rupert say together.

"Brilliant!" Their son smiles at them before he charges off – but then at once he's back, the blur slowing for just a minute. "Er, I don't need to take the bell or anything, do I?"

"Oh, I think we'll hear you without it," Rupert says dryly.

"Thanks, Dad," is carried on the wind behind David's usual pursued-by-werewolves exit, and the thunder of boyish feet is followed by Macallan and Cava erupting from the kitchen and following their charge upstairs.

The echoes fall softly, and Rupert stretches, repressing a wince. He's aching from his hard day, she knows, not to mention the lingering sore throat, and she says, "Hey, honey. Are you feeling too bad to share the sofa?"

"Not at all, darling." Although he starts to shift himself, she's too fast, and with all due care of his muscular discomfort, bruises, and important appendages, she settles herself on top of him. It's one of her favourite positions, his favourite too, as evidenced by his slightly breathless, "Ah, my own personal warming blanket."

"Just one of the many services I provide," she says, threading her fingers with his.

Hands linked, they lie there together and watch the fire for a few moments. It's quiet now, except of course for the heavy six-year-old footsteps and pawsteps from upstairs and the occasional thud from who knows what. She's lulled by the crackle of the fire, the metronome of his heartbeat, until he says quietly, "I'm so sorry that the Council got David's IQ scores – I'll investigate what the bloody hell went wrong when we get back. Perhaps we should take him out of that sodding school –"

"We can't do that. He has friends there, he's happy, he's learning." She kisses his neck, allowing herself a lovely taste, and then settles back down. "None of the Edward Camp mess is your fault, Rupert."

When he says nothing, she sighs. One more Watcher-derived complex she'll have to deal with: he's impossible, he really is. But she tells herself she can worry about this later. Crackle of the fire, metronome of his heartbeat – then he says, a laugh somewhere in the dryness, "I do know what you're thinking." His lips move sweetly against her hairline, and he says, "Dearest, 'Absolve me now of all my sins of the future, so that I may enjoy them without remorse.'"

That sounds familiar somehow... but now that he's asked so nicely, she wriggles up to kiss him better. He tastes of tea and muffins, and Rupert, and ease after a difficult day. "You're absolved," she says when she can, and then rearranges herself slightly so she can look at him. "But you know what, you have fallen down on your husbandly job."

"Have I now," he says, his free hand smoothing back her hair.

"Obviously I'm going to need a new ottoman!" At his groan, she smiles. "And you should buy it for me, because I haven't heard one word from you about my brilliance in choosing that particular piece. I knew somehow from the moment I saw it in Camden Market that it had rare treasure hidden inside."

"Oh, you 'knew somehow.'" His reply defines skepticism.

"Yes, knew somehow. Because –" she gets an amusing, wicked thought – "of my intuition and natural bent for the supernatural, while you're more the paperwork type."

"Anya, for fuck's sake–"

"Who has brittle, aging bones."

He lets go of her hand, so that both of his can slide down to her bottom. "For that, darling, you deserve three. One for insulting your husband–" A smack, sharp and hot, if a little off-target because of the angle. "Two for repeating the horrible joke–" Another smack. That one is aimed just right on the fleshiest part of her arse, and Anya feels pleasure begin to swell in them both. "Three for making me exert myself when I'm tired." That smack is the hardest yet, the best yet.

But then he stops and lets his hands slide away. She pushes herself up so she can glare at him. "Excuse me, Rupert, you call that punishment?"

"No. I call that a taste of things to come." He smiles at her. "I shall allow the perfect time for anticipation and remorse, Anya. And, er, my recovery from various aches."

"Oh, honey," she says, smoothing out the pain-furrow over his brows and then kissing him lightly.

"Just one of the many services I provide," he says, the smile now in his voice.

Anya recaptures his hand, pressing her fingers into his, and then lays her head against his chest again. They do have things to worry about – the Council's intrusion, Dawn's healing from the bad boyfriend, poor Willow and Fred and if there's something to be done for the Davises. Tomorrow, too, they'll have to find a way to lighten the bloodstains on the steps and the path, even if they can't erase them completely.

For this hour, however, they can rest. While David and the dogs safely thud around upstairs, she and Rupert lie on the sofa together, hands clasped, and watch the fire in the darkened fireplace until it's time for supper.

THE END